Nigerian migrant drug dealer Innocent Oseghale has been found guilty of the murder and dismemberment of Italian teenager Pamela Mastropietro and was sentenced to life imprisonment with 18 months of isolation.
The Court of Assizes of Macerata found the Nigerian guilty of every single charge against him from voluntary murder aggravated by sexual assault, insult, to destruction and concealment of a corpse this week, Italian newspaper Il Giornale reports.
Although the lawyer for the Mastropietro family Marco Valerio Verni, who was also the victim’s uncle, was pleased that the Nigerian received a maximum sentence for the killing, Pamela’s mother Alessandra Verni claimed that the drug dealer had not acted alone and must have been helped by accomplices.
Initially, two other men were arrested alongside Oseghale, but both Lucky Awelima and Lucky Desmond were cleared of all charges brought against them.
The defence in the case attempted to allege that Pamela had died of a heroin overdose but the arguments were unable to sway the jury.
Several family members and friends of Pamela were present at the trial, with others setting up posters of the victim outside the courtroom with the caption “truth and justice for Pamela”.
The murder of 18-year-old Pamela Mastropietro, whose body was found on January 31st last year, shocked Italians after it was revealed that her body had been dismembered and left by the side of a road.
Evidence later emerged from Vincenzo Marino, who shared a cell with Oseghale, that saw the case turn even more disturbing when he testified that the Nigerian had confessed the murder to him and claimed that he had begun dismembering the teen while she was still alive.
Marino also told of how Osghale attempted to conceal the murder saying: “He had washed [the body] with bleach because it would not have been known if she had died of an overdose or murdered.”
According to Il Giornale, the testimony from Marino had been crucial to the convictions in the case.